National League at risk

Feel for Torquay and Gloucester who have big leads in their divisions.

Looks like the majority of non league reporters think the season will be scrapped for National Leagues, although some favour suspension, then continued later in the year to conclude by May 2022.

Either of these approaches would result in no relegation from league 2 this season!

One's man loss is another man's gain, we should have the lines buzzing of most the top clubs as there's some serious talent at Stockport, Torquay, Sutton and Hartlepool etc

There is talk on suspending Step 2 and keeping Step 1 which wouldn't help us!

Do we know when the decision is?

Quoted from GrimRob

There is talk on suspending Step 2 and keeping Step 1 which wouldn't help us!

Firstly suspending is abandoning. If they stop they start again until crowds are back in and that won't happen this season.

The problem is that as soon as Step 2 is abandoned every club who can't win promotion in Step 1 will automatically want to abandon also. Step 1 can't stop if Step 2 continues but as soon as Step 2 stops they can do what they like. Torquay will definitely want to continue. Hartlepool, Sutton & Stockport will be happy to continue. But who else is going to want to saddle themselves with debt or sign up to 10 years of reduced income to play on when there's no relegation & those teams chances of promotion rank from unlikely to no chance whatsoever. They just won't want to carry on.

So my prediction is a domino effect. Step 2 abandoned and that triggers the majority of Step 1 clubs to want to stop also.

What it does show is that the clubs were badly informed by the NL into starting a season they never would have without the guarantees they were given. Those clubs would have made signings and took staff off furlough: staff  and players they can no longer afford with money running out fast. It's a big ask for them to saddle themselves with debt when the majority of them have nothing to play for. That's without factoring in the backlog of games some have already built up, to the point where they will have to be playing at least twice a week just to catch up and the impact that will have on players and travel costs.

We need to keep out of this league at all costs, looking at how badly it has been run.

National League South team Concorde Rangers have refused to carry on playing. Think this could be the first of many.

https://www.yorkpress.co.uk/sp.....se-continue-playing/

If the NL is abandoned then will L2 fans pay a tenner to watch every game? Obviously the ones at the top should but for those at the bottom they are just playing for pride.

Staying up courtesy of the NL being suspended won’t fill me with any pride, but with the way it sounds like the NL have handled the situation, it would be an even bigger relief not to be down there. Hopefully if the NL is suspended/abondoned, we’ll still finish outside the relegation places as it’ll feel like we’ve cheated teams like Torquay.